Park Electrochemical Corp. Announces the Sale of its Arizona-Based Mass Lamination Business
Lake Success, New York, April 26, 2001…Park Electrochemical Corp. (NYSE – PKE) announced that it has signed an agreement with Dynamic Details Incorporated relating to the purchase by Dynamic Details, a wholly owned subsidiary of DDi Corp. (NASDAQ-DDIC), of the assets and business of Nelco Technology, Inc. (“NTI”), a wholly owned subsidiary of Park.
NTI is a manufacturer of semi-finished printed wiring boards, commonly known as mass lamination, located in Tempe, Arizona. For the fiscal year ended February 25, 2001, NTI had net sales of approximately $39 million of mass lamination product. Terms of the transaction are not being disclosed at this time. However, Park expects to record a charge of approximately $15 million in its 2002 fiscal year first quarter ended May 27, 2001 in connection with the sale of the assets and business of NTI and the closure of a related support facility to NTI also located in Tempe, Arizona. (The related support facility is referred to internally at Park as NAZ.) The transaction is expected to close on April 27, 2001. Park Electrochemical Corp. will retain all rights to the Nelco name.
Brian Shore, Park’s President and CEO, commented, “This brings to a conclusion the long and painful saga our NTI business has endured since Delco Electronics closed their circuit board manufacturing plant and terminated NTI’s supply agreement with them. Through extremely difficult and dark days, our employees never gave up on this business. Mary Wathen and her team did an absolutely wonderful job in turning this severely damaged business around and restoring some basic dignity to a business which had been dealt a nearly fatal blow as the result of Delco’s termination of this supply agreement. I only wish we could have saved the jobs of all of the employees at NTI and NAZ, but we did our best, and I am gratified that we have been able to save the jobs of at least a portion of our NTI employees. I am also very pleased that DDi will be taking over our NTI business, as I have the highest regard for the DDi business and its management. I believe our NTI employees will be in good hands in the future. (By the way, we are very excited that DDi has recently become one of our key strategic global customers.)”
Brian Shore concluded, “I would like to personally thank every one of our NTI employees for persevering under incredibly difficult circumstances and for creating a good, solid business out of the ashes left behind after Delco’s termination of the supply agreement. I would also like to wish all of our NTI and NAZ employees past and present good luck and Godspeed. They certainly deserve it!”
Certain portions of this press release may be deemed to constitute forward looking statements that are subject to various factors which could cause actual results to differ materially from Park’s expectations. Such factors include, but are not limited to, general conditions in the electronics industry, Park’s competitive position, the status of Park’s relationships with its customers, economic conditions in international markets, the cost and availability of utilities, and the various factors set forth under the caption “Factors That May Affect Future Results” after Item 7 of Park’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended February 27, 2000.
Park Electrochemical Corp. is a leading designer and producer of advanced electronic materials used to fabricate complex multilayer printed circuit boards and interconnection systems. Park specializes in advanced materials for high layer count circuit boards and high-speed digital broadband telecommunications, internet and networking applications. Park’s electronic materials business operates through fully integrated business units in Asia, Europe and North America. The Company’s major manufacturing facilities are located in Singapore, England, France, Germany, New York, Arizona and California. Park’s electronic materials business operates under the “Nelco” name.